The Church in Crisis Is Like The Light of a Dying Star

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If you are speaking about this line, “The Church — Christ’s True Church — will exist on Earth until the Earth passes away. And it will continue to exist in Heaven long after the dying of every star,” I couldn’t agree with you more.

While the Church may have issues to deal with, it will survive, and anyone believing otherwise as not accept the Truth of the Gospel where Christ tells us “…the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”
 
Yeah definitely not the depressing postscript about the cathedral. I should have made that clear. I just looked it over again and thought oops.
 
I try to keep in mind, “the crowds” that followed Jesus were not present at the crucifixion. The crucifixion and resurrection are the defining foundational moments of the Church. And sinful humanity is absent, save for a small remnant.

In my opinion, wishing for the Christendom we’ve enjoyed in the last several centuries is foolish. And too much apologetic effort is invested in trying to reestablish a dominant Christian worldview in people who’s hearts are hardened.
I think Christendom, as a dominant Christian cultural/social/political entity is dead and buried. We are unfortunately the generation that is watching it’s demise accelerate.

There’s a movement afoot who’s focus is the move from Christendom to Apostolic Christianity. The re-proclamation of the Christian kerygma, for it’s own sake, not for the sake of reestablishing the Church’s position in the world.
That effort will obviously produce a smaller, and probably harshly persecuted Church. So be it.
Still:
We wait in joyful hope…
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MasterHaster said:
How do you define survive? A person on life support is “surviving”.
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Nor is a person on life support dead…just as the plug should not be pulled on a patient because they are on life support, if you are using the analogy of the Church being on life support hope is not gone…otherwise “life support” would be called “death hastening”…certainly not all patients on life support die; many recover.
 
I can always count on good ol’ Rod Dreher to write such uplifting and inspiring articles.

(That’s sarcasm, in case anyone is not clear.)
 
/s Ugh, 1P5!!! I don’t need to open that article to know that it’s toxic trash. Don’t you know the rules around here, young feller?

sarc off/
 
MNathaniel said:
I actually found this article encouraging. It sounds like you didn’t?
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I did as well. It reminded me of something a priest wrote on a blog about a year ago after the poll results came out that most Catholics don’t believe in the real presence. He said it showed the world hadn’t been converted to the Church and so the glory age of the faith hadn’t come yet. It was quite uplifting. I think his name was Regis Scanlon.
 
MNathaniel said:
I actually found this article encouraging. It sounds like you didn’t?
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Dude, srsly? Pls share exactly what you found “encouraging” about more of these sky-is-falling, apocalypse-is-coming, churches-are-burning-or-soon-to-shut-down types of dystopian Catholic articles.

The whole subtext to them is that the Church is tottering on the brink of utter ruin except for the faithful remnant still reading this here blog. Sometimes they throw in a little of the ol’ “end of the world is coming soon” for flavor.

I also get the impression that a lof ot these guys are internally rejoicing if this recent crisis somehow gets rid of all those interminable Sunday-only Catholics who probably all use birth control, support gay marriage, want women priests, enjoy guitar Masses, skewed the Pew Research Survey, and keep going to Communion despite the fact that they haven’t been to Confession with all this since 2006.

They’re about as much fun as a tooth extraction!

Edited to add, I do sort of wish someone would make an experimental ambient doom album called “The Church in Crisis is Like the Light of a Dying Star”. I’d listen to that.
 
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Tis_Bearself said:
I also get the impression that a lof ot these guys are internally rejoicing if this recent crisis somehow gets rid of all those interminable Sunday-only Catholics who probably all use birth control, support gay marriage, want women priests, enjoy guitar Masses, skewed the Pew Research Survey, and keep going to Communion despite the fact that they haven’t been to Confession with all this since 2006.
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You mean transform the Church into an exclusive country club for saints instead of a hospital for sinners?

There seems to be lot of these guys in the Catholic blogosphere.
 
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Tis_Bearself said:
Dude, srsly? Pls share exactly what you found “encouraging” about more of these sky-is-falling, apocalypse-is-coming, churches-are-burning-or-soon-to-shut-down types of dystopian Catholic articles.
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Yes “Dude”, “srsly”.

I find it encouraging because… how to put this. The first thing I think of is what is most obvious to me: that as someone raised in a secular-Protestant environment so deteriorated from multi-generational lukewarmness they don’t believe Jesus historically existed anymore, and are pro-abortion pro-euthanasia etc etc and consequently vicious to Christians who aren’t… and as someone entrenched in a university faculty of people actively working to subvert the Catholic Church specifically (not the Catholic Church only, but yes the Catholic Church specifically and by name), I’m familiar with both the crumbling that happens by accident by lukewarm Christians who devolve things from the inside, and the shredding apart that’s accomplished from the outside on purpose. And as someone whose research tracks social change across time, I recognize the slippery slope as frequently not a fallacy, and those who label others as “over exaggerating doomsday prophets” as frequently wrong.

Frankly I’m more frustrated by the crumbling caused by lukewarm people from within, than by the explicit anti-Catholicism that may come from without. It’s just the worst. Give me an enthusiastic practicing Catholic, or give me an atheist, but don’t give me 10 CINOs who will subvert every effort I make to share the truth with my family by secretly telling them behind my back that it’s okay to ignore the message I share today, because eventually the Church will ordain female priests and “come around” on abortion etc, they just have to wait me out. If those CINOs get ‘shaken out’ and shown for what they are (to themselves as well! They may not yet realize they don’t actually believe in Catholicism until stuff really comes to a head, and it’s healthy for them to realize, so they can make a new choice), I think that’s good.

Think of Revelation 3:14-22. This message was written specifically to the church in Laodicea, but it was surely included in the canon of Sacred Scripture because it’s relevant beyond that context.

Key snippet:
‘The words of the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of God’s creation.

“‘I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew you out of my mouth. For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing; not knowing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked. Therefore I counsel you to buy from me gold refined by fire, that you may be rich, and white garments to clothe you and to keep the shame of your nakedness from being seen, and salve to anoint your eyes, that you may see. Those whom I love, I reprove and chasten; so be zealous and repent…"
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Sarcelle said:
You mean transform the Church into an exclusive country club for saints instead of a hospital for sinners?

There seems to be lot of these guys in the Catholic blogosphere.
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This isn’t about wanting the Church to be a country club of saints, and I think it’s unjust to accuse people of wanting that. This is about genuine concern for all the sinners tricked into never entering the hospital, because the sinners already inside turn the lights off, put up barricades, or tell people this isn’t really the best hospital for them, maybe they should go try a different one around the block. There are doctors waiting to heal people in the emergency room and wards, but there are lukewarm and counterproductive front desk workers out front who aren’t processing patients through to those doctors. They’re just playing chess in the foyer and letting confused wounded people walk in and out (very much out, as they haven’t met doctors here so they keep wandering to a different building to try to find that doctor). And so many people never meet the doctors because of it.

And honestly if the walls have to burn down so people can see past the front desk workers to the doctors 50 feet away, I’m fine with that.
 
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goout said:
I think Christendom, as a dominant Christian cultural/social/political entity is dead and buried. We are unfortunately the generation that is watching it’s demise accelerate.
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We might be watching its demise, but I don’t think it’s dead and buried. It isn’t in my parish, and it’s a pretty big parish. All I see is people who love their Catholic faith, their Catholic church, and their Catholic lives. We just want the virus to be over so that we can get back to our normal lives, attending our church and loving our faith. While there are many falling away from the faith–true–there are many who aren’t, and we will remain faithful.

The faith is what it always has been. It’s the society that has changed. And you know what? I hear of more and more people who are finding secularism and materialism insufficient and unsatisfying, in the end. People are returning to the church. I have an older friend who came back after 50 years! I am optimistic and predicting many converts and reverts.
 
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Doom album aside (I’d listen to the crap out of that album), I find it encouraging as well. The beautiful ending lines were a reassuring tidbit after some gloomy meditations.
 
Well, maybe our views differ because we don’t share the same background. My experiences of Catholicism have been for the most part reasonably happy and positive. I was taught that one doesn’t sit around worrying about the end of the world and that one doesn’t concern themselves too much with what other Catholics (or other people in general) are doing. Yeah I was a sinner and probably lukewarm but I came around, other people can too. Even if they seem to be falling down a lot, mankind has always been a sinful lot and it is our job to pray for everyone living and dead in hopes of getting as many people onto the ship of salvation as possible. Human nature also has not changed in 2000+ years and people are probably about as sinful now as they ever were.

If I should turn out somehow to be the Last Catholic on Earth, we’ll worry about that when the time comes.

That’s about the extent of my thought on this.
 
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I can relate to what was posted. I gave up a lot to convert and left the parish where I was confirmed after seeing too many mock the rules of the Church with a mocking and proud manner, including priests. It was too much.
 
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Fair enough. I agree with you that I think our differences of opinion is probably rooted in different backgrounds.

In my wildest fantasies I can only dream of what it’s like to have a Catholic family member, for example. Even one. I feel like that’d be such a comfort.

But we all have our paths and places in life. I imagine you’re in the right place for you, and I’m in the right place for me. Maybe God has us tackling different challenges in different ways.

Edit: I will just add one thing. I imagine we’re both agreed on loving the lukewarm just like loving anyone else, and wanting them to be fully on fire with God, Just like we want that for everyone else. And you’re highlighting that the lukewarm can come around, which is important and good. I think as a convert what I’m trying to convey is that in the meantime, the lukewarm can do a lot of harm to others. And what I mean by ‘others’ is potential converts, or other Catholics who might be weak in their faith and sucked into being lukewarm. So the point isn’t about being unwelcoming to the lukewarm so much as it’s about recognizing how unwelcoming the lukewarm are to others, and how much they interfere with evangelization, and trying to protect people from the harm caused by the lukewarm.

Basically, I wonder if the key ‘disagreement’ here might be over the prudential judgement about how to respond to the lukewarm in a way that moves them towards full life in the Church as soon as possible, while also reaching out to potential converts with effective evangelism and protecting them (and others) from the harms caused by the lukewarm. And it sounds like you’re partial to a position that it’s best to keep the lukewarm ‘tethered’ to the Church even if in name only for awhile, because proximity may gradually help them come back (and maybe that’s been your own experience)? Whereas others are partial to the position that it’s best to have a clear divide between ‘hot’ and ‘cold’ for outsiders and even the cold themselves, because this accelerates decision making and keeps the decision clearer for all, and so by this line of thinking it’s helpful when chastisements shake people out of lukewarmness into hot and cold camps.

Anyway not trying to extend discussion. Just occurred to me that this might be part of how coming from different backgrounds (Catholic-raised? and raised not to worry about what others are doing; versus convert from out in the cold who suffered from Catholics not worrying what I was doing) leads us to see the lukewarm differently.
 
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StudentMI said:
I can relate to what was posted. I gave up a lot to convert
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Like you said. I gave up a lot to convert. I don’t think people who grow up safely entrenched in Catholic community realize sometimes how much some converts have to give up, and how disheartening it is to see the Pearl we gave up so much for, treated as if it’s not worth it.

Like, if I believed the Church was worth so little as some cradle catholics seem, by their conduct, to believe… I’d have been absolutely insane to convert. And being confronted with Catholics who treat their faith like nothing, continually forces me to ask myself: “Did I give up everything for nothing?”

Obviously so far the answer is always “no”. God is good to me in consolations. But being constantly forced to revisit the question in a serious way, is a cross.
 
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